


Honey

by chellerrific



Category: Tales of Series, Tales of Symphonia
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-26
Updated: 2013-06-26
Packaged: 2017-12-16 05:40:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/858476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chellerrific/pseuds/chellerrific
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He always knows how to give a lady just what she needs. Zelos and four of the most important women in his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Honey

**Author's Note:**

> This has been sitting on my phone for a while and I still can’t figure out how I feel about it. I think I keep expecting it to be funnier. Oh well.
> 
> You can read any of these as either romantic or platonic. I’ll ship Zelos with just about anyone tbh.

**fire**  
She made almost no sound when she reached the roof of his house, but then, that was a ninja from Mizuho for you.

“Come for a little moonlit rendezvous?” Zelos asked without turning around.

Sheena hit him on the back of the head, then sat down next to him, careful to keep enough distance between them that he’d really have to reach to “accidentally” cop a feel. “What are you doing up here?”

“Contemplating my place in the universe,” he told her.

She scoffed.

“Ah, I just figured it out. It’s in-between two beautiful women. Your turn. What are _you_ doing here?”

“Regretting I came,” she told him. “I originally came to say goodbye, though.”

He shifted a little so he could get a better look at her. “Goodbye?”

“I’m leaving first thing in the morning for Sylvarant. I’m supposed to assassinate their Chosen, remember?” She fidgeted a little.

Zelos tried to swallow his irritation. She was being used and he hated that, because she’d already been through enough, but there was little he could do about it without blowing everything. “Hey. You’ll be fine.” He reached over to brush his hand on her arm, and he could tell she was really scared because she didn’t immediately slug him.

“Yeah,” she said, not sounding convinced at all.

He leaned in closer, his hand traveling upwards. “If you’re really worried, I can think of a few things we could do so that you have no regrets.”

She _did_ slug him then, yelled a few choice phrases, then alighted from the roof.

He watched her as she hurried away through the streets of Meltokio, hoping that that particular bit of crudeness would keep her fuming instead of fretting for a little while.

* * *

**water**  
She really was stunning, cold and statuesque—like an ice sculpture, he thought, except that didn’t sound flattering, so he didn’t bother figuring out how to work it into a line. Sometimes he even found himself forgetting she was a half-elf.

“Good morning, Your Highness,” he said, presenting her with a rose.

“Ah. _Rosa moschata_. Lovely.” Raine took the flower, setting it down on the ground beside her before going back to the map she was considering.

She seemed so much more than a single year older than him. She was so mature, elegant, self-possessed. He supposed she couldn’t shake the “professor” role, not surrounded as she always was by children. She thought of him as another one of the children, he knew.

“Hey—wait,” he said, leaning over the map. “We don’t want to go this way. The monsters have gotten really thick through this pass. It’s longer to go around this way, but safer—and with less fighting, it might actually end up taking less time.”

“Oh!” Raine studied the new route he’d indicated. “Thank you, Zelos. That’s very valuable information.”

“I am a veritable _font_ of valuable information. I hope you’ll remember that.”

She looked up to meet his eyes, and whatever she saw there softened her expression. “I see. I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Of course, I can be a valuable source of _other_ things as well.”

She went back to the map. “Unless those other things are holy relics from the Church of Martel, I’m not interested.”

He sat there for a long moment trying to think of how to turn that into innuendo, but nothing came to him.

* * *

**earth**  
She sat silently, her thousand-yard stare betraying nothing.

It pained Zelos to see her this way, but he didn’t know what to do about it. He sat down next to her and turned his gaze in the same general direction.

Presea didn’t give any indication she noticed him for a long moment. Finally, she said, “Hello, Zelos.”

“What’s up?” he asked.

She tipped her head skyward. “Tree branches. Leaves. A few clouds. That one slightly resembles a bear.”

Zelos decided to let that one go. It was his own fault for forgetting how literal she was. “What are you thinking about?”

“Loneliness,” she told him frankly.

Loneliness. He wondered if any among them lacked a close and personal relationship with that word.

“I apologize,” she went on when he didn’t respond. “I know you prefer cute girls to smile.”

“That’s true, but a cute girl’s smile doesn’t mean much if there’s nothing behind it. I want to see you smile because it means you’re happy. That’s what I like best.”

Presea considered this. “I see. I don’t know if I can do that, though. I do not feel very happy right now.”

“That’s okay. I intend to stick around until that changes—maybe even help make that change if I can. Just promise me that when the time comes, you’ll let me see it?”

Presea nodded. “I will do my best. Thank you, Zelos. I have concluded that you are not as much of a stupid, insensitive pervert as Sheena says you are.”

He was one part touched, one part wounded. That was women for him.

* * *

**air**  
She was an angel in every sense of the word. He watched her pirouette under the light of the lamp, snow falling on her clothes and the golden hair that spun around her head.

Zelos felt something strange and heavy in his heart. He and Colette were born into the same role, but she had grown into a wellspring of beauty and goodness, while he’d become hard and bitter inside. Was it the influence of a person like Lloyd, or were their souls just that different?

“It’s so beautiful here!” she said, leaning over the railing to get a better view of the city spread out below. “I’ve never seen anything like this before!”

“Me neither,” he said, not looking at the view.

He had been uncomfortable since they’d reached Flanoir. He hated snow, he knew _that_ guy was somewhere in the city, and the weight of the task before him threatened to flatten him completely. But he stayed, and watched, and listened.

“I’m so happy,” Colette said, giving him one of her thousand-watt smiles. “So happy I was able to live to see this moment. I never dreamed this was something I could have.”

Never dreamed she’d see more than a few days past sixteen.

Zelos forced a smile. “Hey, Colette? Is there anything in particular you want to do or see while we’re here?”

She blinked her enormous blue eyes at him, then put a finger to her cheek in thought. “I don’t know. I can’t think of anything I want more than what I already have—being here, alive, in this amazing place, with my friends. I’m so glad you’re here with me, Zelos.”

“Yeah, well,” he said with a joviality he didn’t feel. “We Chosen have to stick together, especially since we’re both so cute. _Right_?”

Colette giggled into her mitten, the sound of a thousand butterflies tickling his skin.

He clapped his hands together. He didn’t have much time to spare, but surely there was time for this. “I know! Let’s go get cocoa!”

Her eyes lit up, and though he knew it was temporary, he felt the heaviness inside lift just a little.


End file.
